Once again, Gaza stands alone in the face of the executioner, as aircrafts bombard it with steel that is made for the frail bodies of children. For its part, the Strip's population is responding with whatever weapons it has available. In the case of Gaza and Palestine, one cannot help but side with the victim, the killed, the dying children and those unable to get what is rightfully and clearly theirs. There is no other option but to show solidarity with the ones who are losing on the international arena and the media battle, while suffering from intentional marginalization and neglect from those near and far. Today, it is right and necessary to support the reaction of the Gaza population against the attempts deployed by the Israeli right wings to carry out overbidding at the level of extremism, using the blood of the Palestinians. It is also necessary for the Israeli public to understand that the electoral games between Netanyahu, Lieberman and Barak will be costly, if the latter try to play them on what seems to be an open arena before Israeli arrogance. But despite that, one might find it difficult to disregard the fact that the armed Palestinian factions walked right into the pit dug by Netanyahu. It is also necessary to see that the current combat round is the first since the end of the second Intifada and the departure of President Yasser Arafat, and that it is being waged by a power which announced its disengagement from the (Iranian-Syrian) rejectionist axis - and consequently from its interests and considerations – against the Israeli army. Hence, it will not be easy for the aforementioned axis to exploit the results and the tragedies which might be caused by today's fighting, in the context of its political and propaganda machine. In other words, the use of the Palestinian sacrifices in the context of the Iranian and Syrian regimes' calculations is over, and the statements of Hamas official Khaled Meshaal were clear in this regard. Nonetheless, there is a great difference between the discontinuation of the mercantile exploitation of the Palestinian sacrifices by foreign powers and the accumulation of these same sacrifices in national and independent political contexts with a clear liberation program. Indeed, the Palestinian arena is still divided and there is not one sign pointing to the Palestinians' imminent formation of some sort of political union. As for the disappointments generated by the Mecca agreement, the Cairo agreement and the mobile negotiation rounds between the two main Palestinian factions, i.e. Fatah and Hamas, they are still being felt. At this level, there is no way to elude the fact that the current military confrontation is ongoing in the best conditions for Israel, and the worst ones for the Palestinians. In addition, despite the major change that affected the overall climate in the region due to the Arab revolutions and the fall of Hosni Mubarak's regime which contributed to the besieging of Gaza instead of helping it in the December 2008 war, this does not seem to be enough to generate strategic change at the level of the Palestinian situation. It appears that this Palestinian domestic defect is deep and dangerous to the point of encouraging Netanyahu's government to exploit it time and again by blackmailing the authority in Ramallah and the Gaza government at the beginning of each month, i.e. when the time comes to pay the salaries of the employees in the authority's institutions, and to launch small wars against the Strip whenever Israel wants to. Moreover, it is encouraging some Palestinians to seek the sustainment of this situation in order to achieve narrow interests, while the reactions and immediate fall of the factions in the Israeli trap – and even their contribution to its erection through their show of power – makes it difficult to count on any change in the mentality managing the battle on the Palestinian side. What is more dangerous is that everyone is aware of the fact that such Palestinian action will face an impasse, and that – on the Palestinian level – Operation Pillar of Cloud will have the same consequences as Operation Cast Lead. Hence, what can be secured by the Palestinians through the current fight is the prevention of the Israeli government from reaping the fruits of its aggression, at a time when domestic division will continue to obstruct any real progress along the path to regain the national rights of the Palestinian people.
